The National Opera & Ballet is among the showpieces of Dutch cultural policy. And rightly so. Like the Concertgebouw Orchestra and the Rijksmuseum, the opera and dance company is among the absolute world's best. That comes with a price tag. A hefty price tag. In the case of The National Opera: €24,420,000, in the case of The National Ballet: €6,950,000. Soon there will be a...
"For someone to interfere with an artistic interpretation, I find that quite hefty. Let me put it this way: you have this prime minister in Turkey... To interfere with something artistic, I find that rather hefty." This was stated by Emil Szarkowicz, musician and cultural editor from Limburg, in a broadcast by regional broadcaster L1 yesterday, Reason being the negative opinion of...
What is already going on on a small scale in Groningen, Enschede, Zaltbommel, Amersfoort, Gorinchem and Vlaardingen, is threatening to happen nationwide as well: cultural institutions falling over while politicians look on helplessly. According to the Council for Culture, the situation is alarming: 'Institutions are draining their own funds, cultural funds are maintaining schemes by drawing on reserves. We therefore make the urgent...
Minister Jet Bussemaker fully embraces the report released by the WRR on Thursday 5 March. In that report, entitled 'Revaluing Culture', the Scientific Council for Government Policy makes an appeal to see culture simply as culture again. "In doing so, the WRR distances itself, and I support it, from the instrumental approach to culture. As if culture only has something to mean...
Radio Netherlands World Broadcasting no longer exists. The subsidy was withdrawn because no one in the VVD knew what it was: shortwave. And because the PVV, which was also in government at the time, finds everything scary that contains the word 'world'. Bad for those who miss calls from the ANWB emergency centre at breakfast for the Alpenkreuzer, even worse for...
Always start with the good news. The Information Department of the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science did a very good job in 2014. They sent one jubilant press release after another into the world. While there was actually hardly any good news to report. About culture. But because there are a lot of lazy journalists, good news often goes in a...
The producers of film and television, who colluded with cable companies not to pay writers for their work, are coming up with a plan. Unwilling to agree to the creators' just demand to just do what the courts have ordered, they set up a fund. Into that, they put the money they feel should...
With a new government in Belgium, the debate on art subsidies has also erupted there. The issue there is only 0.7 per cent of the national budget. The cut of a mere 10% is less substantial than in the Netherlands under the PVV's noose, but the arguments are the same. Though they are often better articulated. Josse de Pauw, international...
Wijbrand Schaap: 'The amateur arts. I experienced the cuts myself at the Utrecht Centre for the Arts in Utrecht. First, they were heavily cut back there back in 2001 under Leefbaar. They survived that, and now they were just recovering a bit...' Joop Daalmeijer: ' ...and now everything is going to the schools.' Wijbrand Schaap: 'There are...
Wijbrand Schaap: 'Just one more point. Then we're almost through.' Joop Daalmeijer: 'Continue quietly, we have until half past five.' Wijbrand Schaap: 'We have a problem with real estate. A lot of inner cities are empty. Shop premises are empty, downtown office buildings are unrentable. What do the municipalities say? Put artists in them. Cost nothing, because for free rent they do...
Wijbrand Schaap: 'The basic infrastructure was keelhauled by Zijlstra while it was not yet ripe. That, in its smaller version, now runs the risk of leading to further rigidity.' Joop Daalmeijer: 'That's a good observation. We are also working on that in our Culture Exploration. We are having a lot of discussions, which we are also taking out into the country. We are starting...
Wijbrand Schaap: 'Now on the role of cities. One of the reactions on our site is about the role of the randstad in cultural policy. Melle Daamen puts the primacy in the randstad, and goes further than the council in this.' Joop Daalmeijer: 'The council has no position yet.' Wijbrand Schaap: 'But there is something in the Culture Outlook. Cities form...
Wijbrand Schaap: 'Next hot issue. Copyright is mentioned in a few passages of the Cultural Exploration. I am also affected by that in various ways. There is, of course, that new author's contract law, which is going to be discussed in the chamber one day, maybe. Nice about that is that the creator's position in that law has been strengthened.' Joop Daalmeijer: 'Rightly so.' Wijbrand Schaap: 'But.
Wijbrand Schaap: 'There has been much talk about the change in Council attitudes under your leadership. After the confrontation course under your predecessor Els Swaab, you seemed appointed by Halbe Zijlstra to act as a kind of applause machine.' Joop Daalmeijer: 'I was not hired by Halbe Zijlstra, I was appointed by the queen. Isn't that nice?...
Wijbrand Schaap: 'When it comes to talent development and embedding in society, it is also very much about the absolute basics. It also touches on the minister's two functions: education and culture. Arts education in primary schools does not really help embedding. No attention has been paid to art in the pedagogical academies for years....
Joop Daalmeijer: 'I never authorise. I find that such nonsense. A journalist should just do his job properly.' Wijbrand Schaap: 'We agree on that then. We write up everything in full, but because conversations about everything tend to be endless, I want to hang it on the Culture Exploration. That's the most concrete piece and the most topical, and it...
We are going to talk about everything, because Joop was a bit fed up. All this criticism of the Council for Culture. That on his leadership it had degenerated into Halbe Zijlstra's lapdog, and that Jet Bussemaker laughs out loud at them. And that they conduct discussion behind a paywall. That's why we're going to talk to Joop Daalmeijer. The President. We agreed...
Update: Meanwhile, the Culture Council has picked up the gauntlet. Melle Daamen posted his pieces on Culture Press, and Joop Daalmeijer has agreed to give a comprehensive interview. More news soon, then. 'Melle is a member of the Supervisory Board. You have nothing to do with that. So that's why NRC anyway?' Dixit Joop Daalmeijer, the man who since he became chairman there...
How can a usually very ordinary, amiable theatre director suddenly come out with the notice That a few orchestras can go away and the National Ballet should be outsourced? We wondered so and headed to the car park at the Concertgebouw yesterday.
We saw it in March already been coming, but now it is official: culture minister Jet Bussemaker is ignoring the Museum Council's advice. So the advisory panel led by Joop Daalmeijer has not done its homework properly: its idea
The Council for Culture, recently reinforced with new members with a lot of management talent and business acumen, has to accept defeat. Indeed, culture minister Jet Bussermaker is disregarding a key pillar of the council's latest advice.
Two new members of the Council for Culture once again show how thinking about art is changing: Jessica Mahn and Annick Schramme are women, which was necessary in this white male stronghold, but they are especially
English (UK) 
Nederlands 
Français
You must be logged in to post a comment.